POLITICAL GENEALOGY

DNA Confirms Biden Link to Galway

Galway joins Mayo and Louth as an Irish ancestral home

Megan Smolenyak
5 min readMar 28, 2021

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President Biden’s ancestral homestead awaits his visit (Google Maps)

Ireland loves to claim her own, so President Biden — who’s conspicuously proud of his 5/8 Irish ancestry — is a source of pride for many in the land of his ancestors. I first explored his heritage before he became Vice President, and later shared some of my findings in Irish America when he was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2013. My research on his mother’s side of the family led to the Cooley Peninsula in County Louth and Ballina in County Mayo, where I was fortunate enough to find his Blewitt cousins. But what about that remaining 1/8 that stemmed from his father’s side?

1870 census for Mary A. Hanafy and her family (Ancestry)

The name in question was Hanafy and it was the 1870 census for his great-grandmother, Mary A. Hanafy, that revealed that her parents had been born in Ireland. I tried to push back further, but as most genealogists know, crossing the pond to Ireland — especially for Famine era and earlier — is an iffy proposition, so this branch of the family tree remained stalled.

Over the years, I’ve heard from a number of people regarding Joe Biden, and when he…

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Megan Smolenyak

Genealogical adventurer & storyteller who loves solving mysteries! You may not know me, but chances are you’ve seen my work. (www.MeganSmolenyak.com)